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Describe a methodology for analysing competence requirements and pinpointing competence enhancements, together with the appropriate training media, which is applicable to all management and technical specialist functions. Argues that the methodology may be integrated with corporate career planning for professionals, and provides a cost‐effective tool for corporate human resource management. Concludes that continual professional development needs to be incorporated in the human resource development policy in order for business organizations to face the challenge of business change successfully.

To some persons, private gardens, public parks, and farms appear to offer a safe way to preserve all of the plants and animals the environment needs. To people who ignore the need for conservation, the idea of paving and pruning and artificially laying out our land from coast to coast seems welcome. Wiser persons perceive that the destruction so imposed on nature would ultimately endanger our existence. The wilderness, with its wealth of animals and plants, holds a treasure from which we already extract the chemicals and genes we need for agricultural breeding, for industrial products, and for healing drugs. What to the layman may look like a disorderly swamp, or a dark forest, or an uninteresting prairie, actually encompasses complicated communities of vegetation and animals of all classes, communities that are held together in a stable balance by their interdependent components. Ecologists are identifying the key principles at work in these ecosystems of wetlands and drylands, forests and prairies. In their search for understanding of how life on our planet functions, they have called attention to the overriding need to preserve and protect the biological diversity that characterizes ecosystems. They have found instances in which short‐sighted human tampering has played havoc with subtle ecological balances. Too frequently entire species have vanished under man's onslaught. Sometimes such a disappearance is an indication that an entire ecosystem is out of balance.

This paper discusses motorsport from the viewpoint of environmental sustainability amid growing concerns about the impact of human activity on the environment. It reviews the literature that positions motorsport in a global environmental context and explores the often used but rarely defined concept of sustainability. The author suggests that while motorsport is a significant sporting activity for economic and social reasons, there are considerable doubts as to whether it is currently managed and marketed in an environmentally sustainable way.

How have department stores fared over the last five years? Patrick McAnally suggests that there has been something of a renaissance, that a newer generation of store has developed alongside the old one. Some of the new ones include Fenwicks and John Lewis at Brent Cross, Debenhams in Stirling and Bentalls in Bracknell — stores which by any standards are as much part of the 1970s as the latest hypermarket.

We publish this month a report of a case which was recently heard by the Stipendiary at Middlesbrough, in which a Co‐operative Society was summoned for being in possession of meat which was condemned as tuberculous and as unfit for human food. In view of the magisterial decision, it is of interest to review the facts of the case. It appears that Inspector WATSON visited the defendant society's slaughter‐house, and that he saw there several carcases hanging up and an employee dressing a carcase which was obviously tuberculous. In reply to Inspector WATSON'S demand, the internal organs of the animal were produced and were found to be covered with tuberculous nodules. Dr. DINGLE, the Medical Officer of Health, accompanied by Mr. G. ANDERSON, the Chief Sanitary Inspector, subsequently visited the slaughter‐house and agreed that the carcase was undoubtedly tuberculous and quite unfit for human food. Accordingly they seized the carcase which was subsequently condemned by order of the magistrate. When the defendant society was summoned before the Court, the counsel for the prosecution pointed out that when Inspector ANDERSON visited the slaughter‐house he asked the slaughterer why he had continued dressing the carcase when it was obvious to anyone that the meat was tuberculous. The condition of the carcase was not disputed by the defendants, but it was contended that the slaughter‐house was under the control of the manager and that no carcase would be removed until it had been inspected by him. In view of this contention for the defence, the magistrate held that it had not been proved that the meat was intended for human food, despite the fact that the diseased internal organs had been removed, and that the carcase had been dressed as if it were intended for use as food. If the decision in all such cases rested upon evidence of a similar nature, it is obvious that the Public Health Acts would become inefficient and useless, inasmuch as it would only be necessary for a defendant to state that any diseased meat found in his slaughter‐house was awaiting the inspection of the manager, and then the law could not interfere. Such a condition of things would obviously be unsatisfactory. The Stipendiary observed that the prosecution was justified, and commended the ability with which the Health Department carried on its work.

The literature on the history of the pub presents an invaluable background to any study of the industry, the very special place it fills in our society, and the wider context of its role in British tourism heritage. Most authors acknowledge that the pub is changing with the times, although a mere glance through such comment bears testatment to the way in which the pub's enduring qualities have survived by gradual evolution and adaptation. Of more topical interest, newspaper articles draw the public's attention to the latest developments and trends in the entertainment and leisure spectrum, and comment on their implications for the community and specifically the public house. For the most part, these are of a nationally introspective nature and the pub is not portrayed as a tourist attraction in its own right This article contrasts the views of three stakeholders within the retail pub industry, namely, the tourist, the landlord and the brewer. It charts their views on the evolution of the public house.

Dual Diagnosis Anonymous (DDA) is a peer-led programme developed in the USA, which aims to address mental and addictive disorders in an integrated manner. This study is part of a mixed-methods evaluation of the first DDA pilot in the UK, and the purpose of this study is to explore the impact and mechanism of change of the programme through the perspective of DDA attendees, facilitators and the funding commissioners.

Six DDA members were interviewed three times over a period of 12 months, the facilitators were interviewed twice and the commissioner was interviewed once. The qualitative longitudinal data were analysed using a trajectory thematic analysis.

DDA attendance was perceived to have had a positive impact on five main areas: acceptance of self, of others and from others; social functioning; self-development; recovery progression; and feeling of hope. The possibility of addressing both mental health and addiction at the same time was a key factor in the recovery process. The facilitators observed that DDA had contributed to integrate members into employment and education, while the commissioner stressed the importance of joint commissioning and sustainability.

The longitudinal approach provided a unique insight into the recovery process of DDA members. Being able to address the mental health as well as the substance use problems was considered to be a fundamental strength of DDA in comparison to the single purpose peer-support fellowships.

The literature on construction and project risk management published during the period from 1960 to 1997 is reviewed and analysed to identify trends and foci in research and practice. This analysis is used to identify gaps and inconsistencies in the knowledge and treatment of construction and project risk. The findings suggested that political, economic, financial and cultural categories of construction risk deserve greater research attention, as do those associated with quality assurance, and occupational health and safety. Temporal aspects of risk, and risk communication, are also important fields for investigation.

In the second part of this report the action of nitrogen peroxide on flour is discussed at some length in an account of a series of researches that have been carried out by DR. MONIER‐WILLIAMS. His conclusions may be briefly stated as follows. The maximum bleaching effect is obtained when each kilogram of flour is treated with from 30 to 100 cubic centimetres of nitrogen peroxide. The bleaching effect becomes more pronounced after keeping for several days. The amount of nitrous acid or nitrites that are present in bleached flour corresponds to about 30 per cent. of the total nitrogen absorbed, the proportion of nitrites present remaining nearly constant after the lapse of several days in the more slightly bleached samples. After the lapse of a short time it is still possible to extract about 60 per cent. of the nitrogen absorbed by the flour by means of cold water, but after several days the nitrogen that can be extracted by this means decreases. This may perhaps be attributed to the “absorption” of nitrous acid by the glutenin and gliadin. In highly bleached flour (300 cubic centimetres of nitrogen peroxide per kilogram of flour) a considerable increase in the amounts of soluble proteins and soluble carbohydrates takes place. In highly bleached flour, after some time, about 6 or 7 per cent. of the nitrogen introduced as nitrogen by the nitrogen peroxide is absorbed by the oil, which acquires the characteristics of an oxidised oil. No evidence is forthcoming as to the formation of diazo compounds nor the production of free nitrogen. Bleaching was found to exercise an inhibitory action on the salivary digestion of flour.

Most countries seek to impose control on the chemical treatment of both human and animal food. Some, such as the U.S.A., attempt it by highly detailed regulations, in terms most orthodox and almost psychically specific, which seem most complicated compared with our own simplified food ordinances; other countries, such as many of the newer states, treading cautiously in their virgin fields of law‐making, pass broad, enabling laws, leaving details to be filled in later. Although the object is the same in all countries, it is nothing short of amazing how the pattern of legislation manages to be so divergent, and applied for reasons that are not always apparent. In published regulations and laws, there would seem to be less intent on making a country's food exports conform to the legislative requirements of importing countries than in prescribing standards for its home products; the end results have produced food law chaos, rarely seen in other branches of law. A notable exception, the only one, to these irregular developments, and with particular reference to food additive control, are the common decrees and directives of the European Economic Community, representing the six Common Market countries. Its Council prescribes quality standards for individual foods, specific purity standards for preservatives and other additives which may be used for human consumption, and although this standardisation is only beginning, it deserves study, especially the manner in which the community regulations are enforced.